Artists need publicity ideas for water tank mural

Publicity Hound Kate Farrall of San Diego, CA, writes:

“I need to get national/international publicity for my two muralist clients who are completing a five-story public art installation this November for the City of Davis, just outside of Sacramento. They have transformed a water tank into 360-degree kinetic art installation. You can see a short video that explains the project.

“My pitches have done well, thanks to your great advice. So far, I’ve gotten my clients a segment on our local PBS channel that will run for a year and a half, along with a few other news and print hits. The feedback on my pitches has been really good and I’ve tailored each one.

“How do I create a hook for national publications, especially art publications? Or even publications that are not so big but located elsewhere? Local has been a good hook for us so far, but that won’t work in the Midwest, New York or Europe. My clients want to be recognized as professional artists and to have a broader name recognition so they can expand where they work and the types of projects they do.

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One of the first things I’d do is go to their Flickr account and write captions and tags for each photo. This will encourage people to use them.

Other ideas:

–This is a little bizarre but I think it might work. Have the artists do a little research (or you do it for them) and compile a list of the “10 top water tanks in the U.S. that are perfect artist palettes” or something like that. And then explain why. That might generate publicity in those local media outlets. (Oh, did I mention that some of these can be actual tanks the artists would love to paint on?)

–Don’t forget creating videos and uploading them to YouTube. Did somebody shoot video while the project was in progress? I hope so.

For inspiration, visit Lori McNee’s blog at http://www.finearttips.com/blog/. She is an internationally recognized artist who specializes in still life and landscape oil paintings. She shares fine art tips, including marketing tips, at her blog. She ranks as one of the Top 100 Most Powerful Women on Twitter and was named a Twitter Powerfhouse by The Huffington Post.

I also highly recommend Alyson B. Stanfield’s blog at http://www.artbizblog.com/. She’s a savvy marketer, a sharp Publicity Hound, and she teaches artists in many genres how to build their art business. You’ll find lots of tips at her blog, and one of them might spark an idea.

3. How about community enhancement/planning pitching? There are so many communities trying to revive themselves. Surely there are publications devoted to city planning. (Art is my bailiwick, so not sure about this one.)

4. I found myself not understanding the scope of the project and think that more explanatory text might be helpful – better storytelling ??? (It could also be the problem with the all caps in the press release.)

5. Trying to figure out something that could be done with the theme of water. Hmmm.

Right now, each of these is a disconnected part — an arm over here, a leg over there… hard to see the entire figure. And each of these are – bluntly put – not well thought out. They are not a coherent whole.

Let’s start with the video: I don’t see the artists. There’s no introduction. There’s no context. There’s no mention of where to go for more information (and that’s just the bare bones of what’s missing…).

Yes, the video might have been meant as just a piece of something else, but online you miss so many opportunities for publicity by not recognizing the inherent *webness* of the WEB.

Press release: Alyson’s spot on. ALL CAPS MAKES IT REALLY HARD TO READ AND WHEN YOU MAKE IT REALLY HARD TO READ PEOPLE DON’T.

NOTE: Everything on the artists’ website is in all caps. If they do nothing else, please, please change this. Looking cool is useless when it means losing your audience.

Flicker photos: Again, the photos aren’t organized in any recognizable fashion, just tossed up. The titles should, at the very least, correspond to the project roll-out so people can follow the story.

Website: Here’s where it all needs to come together. This is where any other community interested in having these artists do a similar project (and what a great way to differentiate themselves! WoW!) is going to come.

Which brings up the first problem: where are they going to go? The artists’ website or the website for the tank project? (And that tank project website, while great looking, has so many inconsistencies — like: North/South/East/West is really the months of the year – huh? — that it undermines, again, their level of professionalism.)

At the very least, both websites need a link to each other – and in an immediately recognizable place (I’d go for the menu buttons).

And I’d be remiss not to mention, for the zillionth time (to make this point, I take great pride in exaggeration) that a black background for an artist’s website makes it very hard on your audience.

Ariane, I made a point of contacting you and encouraging you to comment on this question because I knew you’re one of the foremost experts on artist marketing and you’ve really developed a reputation with your smARTist telesummit. Thank you for such a detailed response! I hope the artists use this as a checklist..

Joan, Celeste, Alyson and Ariane,
Thank you for all of your thoughtful responses to helping this Publicity Hound! I really appreciate the input and ideas that you’ve shared and think they will help to garner more news for the project in different regions. I agree about the website and font improvements, and think the top 10 tanks idea is great! Also it is great to know about the public art publication.